


Libère-toi

by GreenAppleSause



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Body Horror, Canon-Typical spiders, Gen, I did way too much research about spiders for this, Only a little but I felt I should tag it anyway, This references as many characters as I could, Web!Martin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-01
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-11-27 12:30:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18194618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenAppleSause/pseuds/GreenAppleSause
Summary: Watching had never been Annabelle’s forte. Sure, she was good at it, but she didn’t have the patience of one of The Eye’s people.Martin felt he was being watched, and not in the way he was used to. This was far more comforting than it felt when it was Elias or Peter keeping an eye on him.Jon didn't like spiders, but for some reason they were everywhere in The Institute. But the one thing he liked less than spiders was The Web, which may have appeared to be the same on the surface, but it really wasn't.





	Libère-toi

**Author's Note:**

> Self indulgent Web family with protective sister Annabelle keeping an eye on her dumbass brother Martin, meanwhile Jon deals with a few too many spiders.
> 
> Title is from ["Ego"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSjg8yrc8s0) by Indila, and translates to "make yourself free"

Watching had never been Annabelle’s forte. Sure, she was good at it, but she didn’t have the patience of one of The Eye’s people.

They knew she was there, when didn’t they? But they always were too comfortable because they always knew. Despite her brother showing them before that they can hide in plain sight and damage them if they so wished, that they can be anywhere.

For someone known as “the heart of The Eye”, Bouchard was surprisingly blind.

None of them were to directly interact with The Eye’s home or people unless Mother had ordered it, which was why she was there now. Lukas was a threat, taking away her brother.

Mother and Father were going to eat Lukas if he didn’t release her brother.

She remembered a story as to why her brother was allowed into The Eye’s realm. Mother had lured The Archivist when he was but a Blink, and Father had almost eaten him. Apparently The Archivist was saved by a possible future member of The Lightless Flame, and Father ate him instead. It was a good enough revenge for what The Girl did to the man she only remembered being called Raymond. Mother and Father, since then, wanted to keep what was then a Blink in their web.

Brother was sent to The Eye before, when the former Archivist was still there. Annabelle didn’t like her. The old Archivist was rogue, she didn’t even Watch like she was meant to. She was a loose screw, and Bouchard knew that. A weak link must be removed, especially when The Watcher’s Crown was barely a few years around the corner.

Brother lied to get in. Bouchard knew he had lied but also knew what he would become. Mother and The Eye had always gotten along, they had a strange dance they did. Brother didn’t know what he’d be, he still didn’t, but Bouchard knew. _Bouchard always knew_.

It was a few seasons later that The Archivist joined. The old Archivist was still there, but she had lost all favour with Bouchard. It was only a matter of time before she was replaced. Mother watched with interest as her son began to present to the Blink and soon to be Archivist. It was subtle, something The Eye and all its Blinks were never any good at. He tapped at his glasses and mugs, bobbed his head over to see the Blink, but he got nothing.

When Bouchard finally got rid of the pest, the Blink was given the position of Archivist, and brother was sent to assist him along with a girl who had a dying glow in her eyes, and a boy with an anger only The Stranger could instil in someone.

Brother’s presenting went better in the closer quarters, after the issue with The Hive. The tapping of mugs and bobbing of his head started to become noticed. She thought it was weird, as he wasn’t a good dancer, nor did he give brother any gifts, but to each their own, she supposed.

That was when Annabelle had started getting more information on the situation between her brother and The Archivist. She wasn’t the one Mother sent to keep an eye on things. She was the one Mother asked to help spread their reach, make new webs, capture more unsuspecting victims.

One of the few things Annabelle ever witnessed herself was when her brother managed to deal some damage to Bouchard. Mother had thought that he’d need help with his plan, as it was one of the first times he was going to be tapping into his nature.

Brother didn’t need her help, but when Bouchard attacked her brother, she flared. It took everything in her to not attack the heart of The Eye. She couldn’t even be sure her venom would even effect him. Brother had already hurt him by using their lighter.

By the time Bouchard was put away, with some of her siblings being sent to his place, so his Vision would by obscured, the girl with the dying glow and the boy with the anger towards The Stranger were gone, and The Archivist was going through his final stages of being human, brother was alone with The Slaughter’s girl and a new Blink.

Annabelle was then told to make sure brother was taken care of. She sent him boxes of what she remembered as tea and even sent some spiders to watch over him.

Then brother took Lukas’ deal.

Mother was unsure of the best way to get brother back, which was so unlike Mother. That left Annabelle to take care of it.

If there was one thing Annabelle was as good at as she was bad at watching, it was getting people to do what she wanted.

* * *

Martin felt he was being watched, and not in the way he was used to. This was far more comforting than it felt when it was Elias or Peter keeping an eye on him.

He’d felt this kind of watching before, it had always been there, his entire life. It had picked up a bit more when, as he learnt later, Jon had started working at The Institute, and even more so after everything with Jane Prentiss.

He remembered it was strongest when he confronted Elias before his arrest, but that was different. It had felt far more personal than it ever had before. It had always felt impersonal and distant, like Elias and later Peter, but it felt personal then, more like when Jon had been watching them all when he suspected one of them of murdering Gertrude.

It continued to check in on him while Jon was in his coma, even sending him tea, while the watcher’s presence began to feel heavier.

Then he took the offer from Peter Lukas.

The presence stopped feeling distant, it was constant and nearly suffocating. He had begun to suspect all the spiders in his house during Jon’s coma, and with all the spiders now appearing in Peter’s office, he was sure he was right.

One thing he noticed was that, more often than not, the spiders were brown recluse spiders. Another thing he noticed was that they were everywhere. His new flat, the office, public transport, cafes he manages to order at online and then pick up his order without interacting with anyone. All of these places, and all the same type of spider. Brown recluses weren’t uncommon, but this was ridiculous, especially with so many so close to each other. They weren’t a social species.

Aside from the brown recluses following him like a bad smell, there was a girl. She wore a hooded jumper, carried a violin case, and he could only see the ends of obviously dyed blonde hair that certainly hadn’t seen any upkeep. He couldn’t see more than that, but he felt that he should know her, there was a quiver in his bones that told him that _he did know her_.

Peter hated the spiders, more than Jon ever did. He knew the vaugeties of why Jon didn’t like them, but Peter had no such reason. Well, he did, Martin knew that, but it was less reasonable. He had learnt of the alliances between entities while working for Peter, and knew that The Web and The Eye had been aligned for sometime, they even helped save the Archives.

If The Lonely were as close to The Eye as they claimed, why wouldn’t they be aligned with The Web as well? Unless Peter had been lying.

Martin had started to suspect Peter was lying to an extent. He had most likely been close to Elias, but he didn’t think he wanted what was best for The Eye, and was actively sabotaging it. He had picked up on the fact that The Watcher’s Crown, The Eye’s ritual was scheduled for this year, and Peter was isolating Jon to hinder it.

Maybe he was isolating Martin because he wouldn’t abandon his Archivist. Maybe that was why Elias kept hiring people into the Archives. Maybe the Archivist needed someone to complete the ritual.

That train of thought always led him to a dark place, where the feeling of his mind being ripped open by Elias increased tenfold and Jon was on the other end, tearing open his very psyche.

It was one of those times when he threw a stray tape recorder against a wall, hearing the crackle of the flimsy metal break against the wall when he saw the girl again.

She was on the other side of the office door, Martin could see her through the frosted glass. She was tall and thin, more so than any normal person he had met.

‘Brother, may I enter?’ she asked. He knew her hand was on the handle. He didn’t know how he knew, but he reached for the door anyway, letting her in.

The first thing he noticed was the brown recluse on her arm. He had never seen one this close, and that was certainly for a lack of trying and not a lack of opportunity. The second he saw that spider, he knew that she was responsible and that she was part of The Web.

Martin motioned for the girl to enter, had she took the seat across from the one where Martin had been sitting, emailing schedules to Rosie so that she could send them out to the rest of the Institute. ‘Alright, who are you and why have you been following me?’ he asked as he retreated to his seat, surprising himself with how little fear he felt.

She smiled as she pulled down her hood, tiny fangs dripping the necrotic venom brown recluses were known for, six eyes watching him as he moved. ‘You know who I am, brother. You were the one who made me known.’

‘You’re Annabelle Cane?’

She nodded, slow as to not dislodge the spiders in her hair which had more regrowth than bleach blonde at this point. ‘Mother asked for me to watch over you after Lukas came here and tried to take you away from her. Mother doesn’t care for others taking what belongs to Mother. The Archivist only got away from Mother and Father because he was a little Blink, and then he came to you.’

‘I can take a guess at who “Mother” and “Father” are, but why are you calling me “brother”?’ Martin asked, moving his hands to his lap as Annabelle placed hers on the desk, more brown recluses scattering about.

Annabelle cocked her head, blinking her six eyes one at a time, a movement that made Martin feel unsure about the whole situation. ‘Because you are one of us. You are part of Mother, as am I,’ she said with a twitch, a spiderling crawling out from between the stitches in her forehead. ‘As you are my brother, I want to help you get back to your home.’

Martin only took a second to consider. ‘Where is home?’

‘The Archivist.’

* * *

Jon didn't like spiders, but for some reason they were everywhere in The Institute. But the one thing he liked less than spiders was The Web, which may have appeared to be the same on the surface, but it really wasn't.

The Web gave off the same uncanny watching feeling that The Eye did, mixed with the seeming infestation of The Corruption.

There had always been plenty of spiders around, but since he woke, Jon had noticed more and more. Melanie and Basira had told him that they had started to grow in number after Martin left. That along with his goodbye recording before The Unknowing lead to Jon suspecting Martin as part of The Web.

He can’t See Martin anymore, and he knows it’s The Lonely keeping him shrouded, but he remembers that Seeing Martin had never been easy. It was like looking through a fog or a thin shroud instead of the static he got now. He could still do it before though.

But around The Lonely, he gets nothing.

The whole Institute was shrouded in static though. Jon hated it. It was a constant buzzing in the back of his skull, a constant headache, and he just wants it to go away. He knows that the only way to get it to go away is to get rid of Peter Lukas, which didn’t seem like an easy task.

Another spider ran across his desk, larger than all the others he had seen. It had cream stripes down its sides and just sat on the edge of his desk, looking at him. _Waiting_.

He didn’t know why it was waiting, but he knew it was. He didn’t even know why this great raft spider was inside, when it was a water based spider. Despite his better judgement, Jon got up to follow the spider. The feeling he had, drawing him to follow, felt like a mix of somethings he’d felt before, and it was both terrifying and comforting.

The great raft wasn’t particularly fast on land, but it still seemed move fast enough to have to wait for Jon at every turn. It took him through the entire building before it managed to find a brown recluse, which made Jon wary. He knew of the brown recluse’s bite, the necrotic venom that eroded body tissue. If he wasn’t already afraid of spiders, he was sure that this one alone could instill that fear.

The two spiders led him up, towards what was Elias’s old office, at the top of the Institute. Maybe he should have started referring to it as Peter Lukas’s office, but even Jon Knew that was only temporary. He wouldn’t be there long. Peter was just a temporary measure until Elias figures out how to get out.

Through the frosted glass window in the door, Jon could see two figures which told him two things. One, Peter Lukas wasn’t in, and two, Martin wasn’t alone.

‘Brother, he’s here,’ as feminine voice said from inside. Jon felt uneasy just at the sound of the voice. It was a similar unease he felt when he spoke to other avatars, but more so. It felt as is this voice was digging into his soul. Like it was pulling at the threads of his very being, unravelling him from the very core. It was intrusive, like Jared had been, like he had been to “Breekon”.

‘I can see that. Jon, please come in.’ That was Martin, he knew that. But he sounded different as well. Closer in tone to how the other voice was, and it had that same pulling feeling, but it was softer. While the feminine voice felt like it was jerking him around, Martin’s felt like it was coaxing him towards the office, like how he had felt following the larger spider.

He entered, he didn’t have a choice really. Martin and who ever his, he assumed, “sister” was already knew he was there. He couldn’t deny his presence, and as he turned to even see if he could leave, he saw that the two spiders were now more than he could count.

Inside was Martin, as he had expected, and a female. She gave off an air, like she could make him do anything. The first thing he noticed about her, physically, was her six eyes. That was enough to clue him in on who this was.

‘Martin, what are you doing with an avatar of The Web in here? If Daisy knew…’ he trailed off. Martin didn’t know about Daisy being alive. It had only been a few days since the two of them had gotten back.

Martin shook his head. He still hadn’t looked up at Jon, but he still felt like he was being watched by him. ‘I already know about Daisy. I know you didn’t even say goodbye to me in your recording - that hurt, you know.’ Martin stood up then, lifting his head, his eyes closed, but trained towards Jon. ‘I also know that you’re outnumbered in this office, it being The Eye’s territory is inconsequential.’

He opened his eyes then, pair by pair, until all eight watching Jon’s every muscle _twitch_.

It was that moment he became uncomfortable aware of every spider in the office - there had to be hundreds - and that the door was closed. When had it closed? He didn’t close it and both Annabelle and Martin had been in front of him the whole time.

‘You can’t be surprised, Archivist. You’ve been entangled with us since you were a Blink, and Mother didn’t want to let you go easily. You delivered a little Desolation to us, and Father always appreciates a snack, moreso one laced in revenge,’ Annabelle stated, sitting in the chair next to Jon. 

Wait, when did he sit down?

Before he could ask, Martin picked up, having closed his other six eyes, a courtesy Annabelle hadn’t granted Jon. ‘What she’s saying, Jon, is that you never really escaped The Web, but they - _we_ \- no longer mean you any harm, haven’t meant you any harm since that boy was eaten instead of you. Elias never thought you privy to the information, but The Web and The Eye have had a very delicate alliance for sometime now, just as The Eye and The Lonely have had. That’s the whole reason I was even hired here, to support that alliance.’

Jon finally looked at Martin again. He hadn’t changed much aside from the six barely noticeable parts in his skin where his other eyes were, and the two stripes of cream through his hair, which looked familiar to Jon, in a way he couldn’t quite place.

‘So Elias knew you lied on your CV?’

Jon could see Martin fighting an eye roll with his main eyes, but also saw the twitch below the skin where his other eyes were. ‘Of course he knew, Jon. Lies and manipulation are part of The Web; a part of _me_. But he also thought I was… lower down the chain than I am…’

‘Brother is on the same level as you, Archivist, the same level as me,’ Annabelle finished. ‘Integral to our ritual if we get the chance. We’re no Heart or Ringleader, but without us, without you, our respective rituals will fall apart. The Ringleader made that mistake herself.’

Jon looked between the two. ‘You’re saying The Unknowing would have failed without our intervention? That Tim’s sacrifice was for nothing?’

‘No! What she’s saying is that without something human, corrupted as it may be, to ground the ritual, it was far easier to disrupt! That if they had someone like us, we wouldn’t have been able to disrupt the ritual without disrupting the foundations of The Stranger! And that’s what The Lonely’s doing to you!’

A hand rested on Martin’s shoulder. ‘Brother, calm down. Archivist, what you did was necessary, though now The Stranger has a Calliopist for their next attempt. But they will not be a problem so long as your ritual goes well.’

‘Peter has been trying to disrupt The Watcher’s Crown, your ritual, which is meant to take place later this year. He’s been turning the Institute into a place of isolation instead of knowledge, using me to do it. I don’t know if he knows what I am, or if Elias kept that from him. Either way, he’s been taking statements from the Archives, ones that would probably help your ritual go well.’

Martin took a pile of statements off the desk as passed them over to the still sitting Jon. ‘Why are you helping us?’

Martin shrugged and looked to the girl with two toned hair. ‘The same reason The Slaughter’s girl, I can’t remember her title, and the Huntress, are being allowed to help. Because we benefit. We spiders have plenty of eyes for you to look though, and if you want something from someone, we can make sure you get it - any artifact or book you could dream of. The Hunt and Slaughter will always get to know where their targets are, and can bring you the head of anyone who dare to keep a secret from or lie to you.’

Martin nodded in agreement. ‘Well, also because that bit of humanity in me wants to help you, wants to help _Jon_.’

Jon nodded, looking at the pile of statements he was going to have to go through. He was going to have to get the girls to help him with this. ‘Does this mean you’ll be coming back to the Archives?’

‘I can’t have Peter catch on to this. We can only go so far before he starts trying to take the others.’ Martin’s sad smile pulled something in him. ‘Don’t worry though, I’ll always be close by.’

Before he knew what was happening, Martin placed a hand on his shoulder, lifting it to show the same great raft spider that had lead Jon up there. He Knew it was the same one.

Martin’s smile grew warmer has the three of them made their way to the door, Annabelle crossing the threshold first, waiting at the end of the hall.

Jon turned around to say goodbye to Martin before the door would close and he wouldn’t see Martin for who knows how long.

Quicker than he could register, Martin leaned in to whisper to Jon, ‘Take care of us,’ before kissing him on the cheek and slamming the door.

Stunned, Jon just stared at the frosted glass, great raft spider on his shoulder and a tingling in his cheek.

‘Archivist, come along, I will be joining your team,’ Annabelle called from the end of the hall.

Nodding, he walked through the Institute with the avatar of The Web in toe. It wasn’t until they had made it to the door to the Archives that Annabelle spoke again.

‘If you hurt my brother in anyway, I will make sure Father actually eats you this time.’

**Author's Note:**

> A few things to address here:
> 
> 1) Annabelle on has six eyes since she is heavily represented in this work by the brown recluse spider, which only has six eyes. That's also why she is seen with a violin case, since brown recluses have a violin shaped mark on their heads.  
> 2) I had no idea how to write Martin. I wanted to get the coldness he's been showing as of late in series, but still keep how he was prior to The Unknowing.  
> 3) Jon and Martin's parts are set several days apart; Martin's part taking place before Jon got his ribs removed, and Jon's, as stated, a few days after Daisy was recovered.  
> 4) Martin didn't just accept that he was part of The Web instantly, Annabelle had to convince him, but he did see the logic in it.  
> 5) Annabelle's part was my favourite part to write, which is why it a bit better than the rest.  
> 6) The so-called "flirting" described by Annabelle is in reference to great raft spiders and how they attract mates, since I associate Martin with great rafts, which why he also has cream in his hair as of Jon's section.  
> 7) Both Jon and Basira are referred to as "Blinks". This is how The Web (at least in my head) refers to followers of The Eye that don't have a special title (i.e. Archivist or Heart for The Eye and Ringleader or Calliopist for The Stranger).
> 
> If you have any other questions (especially about spiders since I now know too much) ask away, and I hope you enjoyed.


End file.
